Category Archives: Vanilla Air

Vanilla Air (Tokyo-Narita) today (March 14) introduced its first new “LOHACO Jet” special scheme on its Airbus A320-211 JA8391 (msn 300). The aircraft will go into service tomorrow. The airline issued this short statement (translated from Japanese) with photos:

To commemorate the surprise giveaway event tomorrow (March 15) the new LOHACO jet will be flown on flight JW 903 departing from Sapporo.

According to ZipanguFlyer, JA8391 will promote the new association with “LOHACO, an e-commerce website jointly operated by major online office appliance seller ASKUL and Yahoo! Japan.”

AirAsia’s (AirAsia.com) (Malaysia) (Kuala Lumpur) CEO Tony Fernandes is taking another crack at the Japanese LCC market with the return of AirAsia Japan according to Bloomberg. Tony Fernandes was recently in Japan and stated he was lining up new Japanese partners.

Yoshinori Odagiri, the former CEO of AirAsia Japan will also lead the new carrier with Osamu Hata, previously a chief financial officer at Japan’s Dell unit according to Bloomberg.

The previous AirAsia Japan (Tokyo-Narita) was a low-fare joint venture with ANA (All Nippon Airways) (Tokyo) that operated from August 1, 2012 through August 31, 2013. The old AirAsia Japan was the fifth subsidiary/joint venture of AirAsia.

ANA turn its portion of the joint venture of AirAsia Japan into Vanilla Air. Vanilla Air’s fleet will grow to six Airbus A320s by next month, eight by March 2015, and 10 by March 2016 according to ZipanguFlyer.

Read the full report on the second coming of AirAsia Japan from ZipanguFlyer: CLICK HERE

Vanilla Air (formerly AirAsia Japan) (Tokyo-Narita) as planned, relaunched operations on December 20 under this new brand. The first routes were from Tokyo (Narita) to Naha, Okinawa and Tokyo (Narita) to Taipei (Taoyuan).

Tokyo (Narita) – Sapporo will be started next month followed by Tokyo (Narita) – Seoul (Incheon) in March 2014.

Vanilla Air (formerly AirAsia Japan) (Tokyo-Narita), Japan’s newest low-cost carrier has taken delivery of its first A320 (A320-216 JA01VA, msn 5844) in Toulouse, France, on lease from AWAS. The airline will start commercial services on December 20 from Tokyo’s Narita International Airport to Okinawa and Taipei, gradually expanding services to Sapporo and Seoul (Incheon) and international holiday resort destinations

Vanilla Air’s A320 is configured with 180 seats in a high comfort all economy layout. The aircraft is equipped with Sharklet fuel saving wing tip devices and powered by CFM56 engines.

AirAsia Japan (Tokyo-Narita), the failed joint venture between AirAsia (Malaysia) (Kuala Lumpur) and ANA (All Nippon Airways) (Tokyo), will be rebranded as Vanilla Air by its now full parent, ANA, which acquired AirAsia’s shares in the joint venture. Vanilla Air will become the new name in December. In the meantime, AirAsia Japan is cancelling hundreds of flights between September 1 and October 26 (see below).